A race apart

During May of 2001, while on a course in Amsterdam, I managed to visit the home of Ann Frank. One could not but be moved in reading the diary excerpts and viewing the room that in which she hid.


On a dark dank December night that same year while in Boston on another training course I visited the Jewish memorial, and was yet again moved in reading the thousands of names inscribed on that structure.



As you look up from these monoliths, the six large towers of glass immediately grab your attention.
Each of these towers represents one of the sixth death camps (Belzec, Auschwitz-Birkenau, Sobibor, Majdanek, Treblinka, and Chelmno). Each tower is made out of plates of glass that are etched with white numbers, which represent the registration numbers of victims.
When you walk underneath the tower, you realize a number of things.
When standing there, your eyes are immediately drawn to the numbers on the glass. Then, your eyes focus on a short quote from survivors, different on each tower, about life either before, within, or after the camps. Soon, you realize that you are standing upon a grate in which warm air is coming out. As Stanley Saitowitz, the designer of the memorial, described it, "like human breath as it passes through the glass chimneys to heaven."

While on a short break in Prague last week I visited the Jewish memorial in the Pinkas Synagogue.


The Pinkas Synagogue is dedicated to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust from Bohemia and Moravia; their 77,297 names are inscribed on the walls of the main nave and adjoining areas.
The text of the inscriptions was compiled from card indexes, which were drawn up shortly after the war on the basis of extant transport papers, registration lists and survivor's accounts.
As I visited all these sites I couldn't help but be moved to tears as I thought of the inhumanity inflicted on young and old alike, male and female. Surely there is something exceptional about the race of Jews, who have faced persecution throughout history.
Is it because the Messiah was to come from David's line?
Issiah 62
1 For Zion's sake I will not keep silent,
for Jerusalem's sake I will not remain quiet,
till her righteousness shines out like the dawn,
her salvation like a blazing torch.
2The nations will see your righteousness,
and all kings your glory;
you will be called by a new name
that the mouth of the LORD will bestow.
3You will be a crown of splendor in the LORD's hand,
a royal diadem in the hand of your God.
4No longer will they call you Deserted,
or name your land Desolate.